I flushed, shaking my head and trying to melt into the sheets. Theo just watched me squirm under his gaze, drawing little circles on my hip. “Hungry?”
My stomach growled in response, and Theo let out a breathy laugh through his nose, hopping out of bed long enough to bring the food tray over. He set it between us, then poured us each a cup of coffee from the carafe on the table and handed me that first.
I inhaled the rich, chocolatey scent, leaning back against the headboard. “Thank you. I feel like a princess.”
Theo smiled. “We’re almost to San Marco, should be anchoring soon. I was thinking we could go to shore.” He paused long enough to take a big bite out of a piece of bacon. “I’d like to take you shopping.”
I giggled, grabbing a piece of bacon for myself. I pointed it at him before taking a bite. “I feel like that’s more fun for you than for me.”
“Humor me,” he said on a shrug. “Besides, San Marco is beautiful. Lots of photo opportunities. And… I thought maybe…” He paused, rolling over in the giant bed until he could reach the bedside table. He opened the drawer and faced me again with a box in his hand. “You could use this.”
I took a sip of my coffee before setting it aside, taking the box from Theo’s hands. It was a simple but heavy white box wrapped with a navy blue ribbon. When I opened it, I nearly had a heart attack from shock.
“Theo…” I whispered, just staring at the beautiful camera inside the box. I was too afraid to touch it, because I knew just by the model number on top that it cost more than four times what I’d paid for the camera I already had.
“I know it’s probably going to take some getting used to,” he said hurriedly, pulling the Sony a7 IV from the box since I was too afraid to touch it. He turned it on, placing it in my shaking hands. “And I think it’s more of a landscape-focused camera, but I read that it’s stunning for street photography once you figure out the settings. Oh, I got a few lenses for it, too, and the best memory card I could find.” He frowned as he watched me tilt the camera in my hands. “Do you like it? If not, I can send it back, it’s okay if it’s not the—”
“Theo, it has sixty-one megapixels and a Bionz X image processor,” I said, as if that should have been answer enough to the question. “I don’t like it. I love it. I am floored by it. I am… dazzled by it. I am scared of it,” I added with a laugh, letting the machine rest in my lap as my eyes found his. “And I am completely blown away that you got this for me.”
Theo smirked. “Well, I know you’ll do brilliant things with it.”
He leaned in to kiss me before I could blush properly, and I abandoned the camera altogether, wrapping my arms around his neck and holding him to me.
Once again I found it felt like a dream having Theo in my grasp. It was both foreign and the most natural thing I’d ever done, to have my lips pressed to his, to have his body flush against my own.
Something niggled at my gut, like a warning or a reminder, but it was so faint I ignored it in favor of the sensations that flooded me when Theo kissed me the way he did.
He groaned when my tongue swept inside his mouth, hot and eager, and I arched into the touch as a humming vibration spiraled down my spine.
“Eat breakfast and then get dressed,” Theo said, breaking the kiss with a stiff inhale. “Before I keep you in this room all day, instead.”
My thighs clenched. “That doesn’t sound so bad…”
Theo thumbed my jaw with a knowing smile. “Don’t worry, Aspen,” he whispered. “There will be plenty of time for me to fuck you properly.”
Another zing ripped through my stomach, and I held my breath, closing my eyes at the feel of his warm thumb against my skin.
“But for now, let me spoil you,” he said, popping my butt as he hopped out of bed. “After the last forty-eight hours you’ve had, you deserve it. Eat. Get dressed. Meet me downstairs.” He paused at the door, nodding to the closet at the far end of the suite. “Emma unpacked your bag for you. I hope you don’t mind.”
Then he left me, and I gaped at the camera next to me, at the luxurious bed I was in, at the vast and stunning room and the equally impressive view out the windows.
What is even happening right now?
How is this real life?
I closed my eyes on a squeal, allowing myself sixty seconds to flop around in the bed in a fit of giggles before I sat up, still breathing hard, still shaking my head in disbelief.
Then, I scarfed down some food, quickly got dressed, and ran downstairs with my new camera in tow.
Theo was right — San Marco di Castellabate was stunning.
With its golden beaches, turquoise water, and sea cliffs that seemed to extend up into the heavens themselves, I found myself lost in wonder as we made our way through the little villages that made up the area they called San Marco. I toyed with the settings on my new camera, completely wrapped up in the experimentation of getting to know it. Theo had outdone himself with the various lenses he’d paired with the gift — each of which I knew cost over a thousand dollars — and never in my life had I held so much expensive, elegant camera equipment in my backpack.
I felt like a little kid again, wide-eyed and all smiles as we weaved through the sights.
And when my hand wasn’t on
